. . . let's be grateful for the treasures included here . . . Montserrat Caballé and Plácido Domingo join forces in a "Manon Lescaut" "Tu, tu amore? Tu?" of heart-stopping passion and vocal richness, underlined by the young James Levine's orchestral ardor . . . Karl Böhm always seemed to elicit their best, which was dazzling. A theatrical wizard able to draw out Strauss's own theatrical genius, Böhm helps Nilsson bring out surprising colors by achieving an infinite spectrum of them in the orchestra for her to match. Nilsson is in spectacular vocal form and acts the living daylights out of the scene . . . it's a joy to have this tantalizing sampling, in which Corelli is joined by the perennially underrated Teresa Zylis-Gara as Desdemona. The "Otello" excerpt provides a suitable ending to a sampling of some of Bing's greatest stars.